Nigella Lawson denies misleading police over drug use

http://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2013/dec/05/nigella-lawson-denies-misleading-police-drug-cocaine

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Nigella Lawson has been accused of not telling the truth to the police by failing to admit to drug use when she gave a statement saying she did not want to give evidence in the fraud trial of her two former assistants.

Appearing for the second day in the trial of Elisabetta and Francesca Grillo, the 53-year-old TV chef denied misleading the police when she told them in October that she did not want to testify because she believed "untrue allegations" about her drug use were being "peddled" to the media and online by her ex-husband, Charles Saatchi. She has claimed Saatchi was using the case to air his grievances over their marriage breakdown. She did not confess in the statement given to police on 10 October to any drug use, Lawson confirmed.

On Wednesday she admitted to using cocaine on seven occasions over two periods, first in 1999 as her then husband John Diamond died of cancer and again, once, in 2010. She also admitted to smoking cannabis on several occasions.

"It wasn't true, was it, what you were saying in the [police] statement?" said Karina Arden, counsel for Francesca Grillo.

Lawson replied: "It was true in that what my ex-husband was saying was that he was getting cocaine out of my nose at Scott's and that I had been completely off my head for 10 years. He had been peddling this beforehand."

"The stories that were being peddled were that you were a drug addict," said Arden.

"I am not proud that I took drugs, but that does not make me a drug addict or a habitual drug user," said Lawson.

"Why does it not appear there [in the police statement]?" asked Arden.

"I was asked my reasons for not wanting to appear and I gave those reasons," she said.

"Did you tell the officer that part of the story [being peddled] was true in that you had taken cocaine but that you did not want any information about cocaine to come out?" asked Arden.

Lawson replied: "No, I did not say that."

Arden asked whether she maintained that she had taken the drug only seven times.

"That is my evidence on oath, yes," said Lawson.

Appearing in sober black clothes and speaking clearly, Lawson also rejected suggestions that she was using the trial as an opportunity to limit her reputational damage and "explain herself to the world press".

Arden put it to Lawson that she had come to court as part of a damage limitation exercise after realising she was in a "damned-I-do and damned-I-don't" situation because allegations about her past drug use had appeared on a blog and been referred to in court.

"You dressed it up as your 'civic duty'," said Arden. "[But] it is right to say that you have to some extent used this case as a vehicle for you to explain yourself to the world press."

Lawson replied that she had merely wanted to make it clear that the allegations of drug use had nothing to do with the much-publicised incident outside Scott's restaurant in Mayfair in June this year, when her then husband was photographed clutching her by the throat.

She said the argument that led to him assaulting her had nothing to do with drugs – as has been suggested – but had erupted after she told him how keen she was to have grandchildren and he had told her that she should be interested only in him.

"Mr Saatchi was not examining me for cocaine," she said. "That's a story he made up afterwards to clear his name."

Arden then asked Lawson about the role that Francesca Grillo played in family life as a vivid picture emerged of the lifestyle of the household.

The court was told the couple employed swimming pool cleaners, window cleaners, upholstery cleaners and wooden floor cleaners as well as silver cleaners to polish silver tea and coffee sets, trays and candle sticks kept in their own 12ft by 12ft room. Lawson referred twice to how lucky Francesca Grillo was to have such a post as "a cleaner who could employ cleaners", adding: "It was a good gig; she was the cleaner who never had to clean."

The court has heard that the Grillos' defence is that the alleged £685,000 of fraudulent spending was tacitly or explicitly approved because they knew about Lawson's drug use and they were allowed to spend on the family accounts on the understanding that they would not tell Saatchi.

Francesca Grillo, Lawson confirmed on Thursday, became "like family" and was allowed to spend what she needed while taking their children on holiday around the world. Lawson came to rely on her to the extent that she once called the Italian housekeeper when she was on holiday in Spain to ask where the TV remote control was.

Francesca Grillo took Lawson's children and step-daughter and sometimes their friends on holidays, including to Paris, New York, Miami, Los Angeles and Berlin, the court heard.

"There were a lot of expenses on these holidays," said Arden. "They were expenses where it was believed or it was understood she would spend what was necessary."

"Yes," Lawson replied.

Other destinations where she accompanied the children included St Tropez and Cannes in the south of France and Cornwall.

In late March and early April 2006 Francesca Grillo accompanied Lawson's step-daughter Phoebe and a friend to stay in New York at Soho House and then on to Miami.

In December 2009, Francesca and Elisabetta Grillo took the children on a holiday to their family home in Calabria, southern Italy, with a stop-over in Rome, the court heard.

Lawson told how her circle of six female domestic and work assistants, including the Grillo sisters, known as "Team Cupcake", were like a "sisterhood" to her.

She said they were "my work family, just people I liked to be around and I think for the children it is nice growing up with lots of people around. The more love they can get the better."

She said there were "sometimes hostilities between some people in the office – there were factions", but she stood by a description of them she gave as "an old-fashioned extended family with extended aunts".

Francesca Grillo lived in an adjoining apartment to the family home on Eaton Square in London, which she was allowed to furnish with a credit card supplied to her when she started work as a housekeeper in around 2002, Lawson confirmed. She had no work contract and the children and Lawson would sometimes go in and out of her quarters.

Lawson told the court her duties included fetching frappuccino iced coffees for Saatchi and sewing buttons on his suits and "she was particularly involved in buying Mr Saatchi's eggs". As a housekeeper she would take instructions from Saatchi, who "would go round pointing at marks he wanted removed", Lawson said.

Arden put it to Lawson there were "countless occasions where you said treat yourself to a whole range of things", including shoes and clothes. Lawson said she would sometimes suggest she would buy something specific for herself, but would "never say 'treat yourself, get a present', not least because it seems like quite a hurtful thing to do because it seems like you can't be bothered".

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